“Finders keep and losers seek,” half chanted Case.
“That’s what’s in my mind,” Clay went on. “I know that it isn’t just right, but I found them; and, then, I don’t see no philanthropic person bringing back our stolen money.”
“No one knows we found them,” Alex suggested.
Then the three boys looked into each other’s eyes and smiled.
“You know you won’t keep them!” Case declared. “You know very well that you’ll hunt the city, or the world, over for the owner if he doesn’t come after them.”
“You know you never meant to keep them,” Alex added. “When I hinted that no one knew about them being here I didn’t mean anything by it. You know I didn’t.”
“For just a second I meant to keep them,” Clay confessed. “I was thinking what we might do with them, you see. If we kept them Jule need never know about the robbery. He really ought not to have left the boat, not with all that money here, you see, and so he’ll blame himself just as much as if he had taken the money himself. But of course that was just an impulse. I really don’t mean to keep them!”
“There’s that hand moving on the door again!” whispered Alex.
“How do you know it is a hand?” demanded Case. “It may be the muzzle of a gun or the billy of a policeman.”
“The only way to find out,” suggested Clay, “is to open the door and see who’s there.”